Hide the Penny

I found out seven years ago, apparently there are very few things that are equal to the entertainment value of "watching mommy get ready". For the past seven years, I have rarely been able to do my hair and make-up alone. But hey, my boys will grow-up to be understanding husbands when their wife has to budget monthly for make-up/hair products. Noah was sitting on the toilet (not going to the bathroom) talking to me yesterday as I got ready to take Ethan to the clinic. He was speaking some strange "sports" language and I was answering "really?" "NO WAY!" and "Who is Stanley and why is his cup so great?" As Noah was talking, I put him to work wiping off the counter. I have a shelf on the counter that holds lotions, a candle, eye cream, etc... I know, shocking I wear eye cream- I don't just wake up looking like this. Although, one of my students saw me early in the morning as I was making sub plans on the day I was certain I had the swine flu. I didn't have any make-up on, I simply showered and left the house. He didn't notice I looked different at all, oh, I take that back. I was wearing sweat pants, and that was different. Anyway, Noah moved the shelf to wipe off the counter and found a penny. I told him he should give it to Ethan to put in his shoe so he'd have better luck. Noah wandered into the kitchen where Ethan was and rubbed the penny on his foot, played "heads or tails" with Ethan and then put it in his piggy bank. Noah's so cheap that truly EVERY penny counts. Meanwhile Ethan came in to the bathroom to partake in the entertain known as "mommy getting ready". Now he is sitting on the toilet. He's talking and singing and suddenly moves the shelf saying, "MOM! I hid something for you... Do you think you'll find it?" Obviously not finding the penny, runs out of the bathroom yelling, "NO-AH!!!" Ethan got his penny back and "hid" it somewhere else for me to find. He's so funny. Last summer he was hiding from me, but forgot to tell me. Noah told me, "Oh, Ethan's been hiding for like 15 minutes. He wants you to go find him." When I found him he was so excited, he thought he found a super great hiding spot that took mom 15 minutes to track down.
Three is one to many dogs. When it was just Max and Abby, things were calm. Actually, I take that back, broken liquor store dog is the one too many dogs, because if Max or Abby are outside, the house is still a circus act, when Sam is outside, it is calm. He is HUGE. Yet he looks at Max and Abby and thinks, "I must be a lap dog too" so he jumps and climbs on us like he's a six pound dog, not twenty-six pounds. When we sleep, Max and Abby sleeps. When Sam sleeps, we get to sleep because he doesn't care we are sleeping, he will jump on us, bark at us, bring us his food dish, drop his bone incessantly on the kitchen floor, or better yet, bark at his bone if it is out of reach. I swear, he is always barking. He's not the only one that barks, Abby barks, but only when Sam is rilling her up. The only thing that saves him is he's a happy dog, I have never seen him anything but happy. Abby gets sad and anxious when she knows we are leaving, Sam wags his tail like, "when they leave I get a treat! Maybe they'll leave more than once today!" Max is very shy and timid, whereas Sam is all "Hi! I am a little puppy, please try to carry me around". The other dogs freak out at the vet whining, barking, peeing themselves, pooping everywhere. Sam walks in like it's his second home and they've been waiting to see him. Even after he got fixed, he ran in the backyard like, "hey I can run faster now!" Maybe his perpetual happiness has something to do with him being found at a liquor store.